Shane Peiris, Founder and Managing Director, Seasons.lk

On this week’s edition of ‘The Founder’ we feature Shane Peiris, Founder and Managing Director of Seasons.lk. An alumnus of St. Peters College, Shane has an impressive resume; a graduate of CIM (The Chartered Institute of Marketing) and BCS (The British Computer Society), he is also an Oracle Databases 10g SQL Expert and a Microsoft Certified Professional.

In your own words, what is Seasons.lk? Seasons.lk is your one-stop online mall, that caters to the entire family. We have the largest product catalogue in Sri Lanka. If you don't find what you're looking for on our website, you can simply inquire via Social Media or our Hotline, and we will source it for you.

What inspired you? In 2017, I found myself over-weight and I desperately wanted to change my life. With self-discipline, I was able to reduce my weight from 80 kgs to 62 kgs. This boosted my confidence, and fuelled me to leave my comfort zone, and take risks. I resigned from my 9 to 5 job and started Seasons.lk.

What was the journey like, starting from scratch and building the business up to where it is right now? I am fortunate to be a part of a team who wake up each morning and do what makes them happy. It’s an absolute joy to see Seasons.lk evolve from the acorn it was to the fruitful tree it is today. It was a lot of hard work at the start; late nights and continuously working without a break. We were all determined to make a success of our start-up.

What were the hardships you faced as an owner, what was the toughest one yet? I hail from a very humble background; I grew up with almost nothing. When launching my company, the biggest challenge I faced was raising the required capital. I needed capital to start the business, to market the business and to scale up. This was the biggest challenge I faced.

What has been the most frustrating thing about being a start up? I now understand, good things take time. However, like most Entrepreneurs, I initially found myself wanting to see quick growth and rapid development in operations. I didn’t have patience to sit and watch a slow roll out. I wanted to accelerate our growth and was eager to increase our revenue overnight. This was a steep learning curve; to be patient and to grow the business one step at a time.

Explain a few marketing strategies you have implemented, and what makes them successful? In a market where we are expected to provide our consumers with offers, discounts and enticing deals, we decided to put value over offers. I firmly believe that offers will remain for a certain time but the value remains forever. For Seasons.lk our greatest marketing tool has been word-of-mouth and Social Media marketing. We soon understood that the more customer care, service and value we provided, word-of-mouth kept bringing us more business.

What motivates you to do what you do on a daily basis? I am a strong believer in rising up by lifting others. Seasons.lk has given me an opportunity to provide jobs for many others; both directly and indirectly. It also gives me great pleasure to receive positive feedback from our customers. I earn my bread and butter via this company; hence I know if I am to also uplift my standard of living, I need to work hard and grow the company to greater heights.

How did you get the initial start-up capital? Seasons.lk is a partnership. My partner and I are very hesitant to take loans, and play around with capital that doesn’t really belong to us. We didn’t want to be in debt. Hence, we liquidated some assets and invested that as the initial start-up capital.

What separates Seasons from its competitors? Trust; we provide our customers only with genuine products that have local and international warranties. We only sell products we would be interested to purchase ourselves. We also believe in strong customer service and hence we invest time and money in training our team on Customer service. We are available on call or via email 24/7. I believe our attention to detail and our on-call accessibility is what separates us from our competitors.

What is your definition for the word success? To live life as per my own rules. To not be in debt and to continuously keep improving my life with discipline and a positive mind.

When did you discover your passion for your business? After following the success story of Alibaba and Amazon, I was driven to weave my own success story in the e-commerce world.

Was your family supportive of your new venture? Yes. Absolutely. They have played a vital role in evolving the business to what it is today. They are my pillars, my support system.

What is the end goal for Seasons? When we look at Asia, we see potential, we see opportunity and we see no boundaries. Similarly, with Seasons.lk the sky is the limit. We want to be one of the best e-commerce players in the Asian region.

What advice would you give other start-ups? Believe in yourself, in your vision, in your end goal and most importantly in your business idea. You must be passionate and must unconditionally believe in your business idea. If you’d believe in it, no one else will, and you won’t be able to successfully convince others either. Focus is key, don’t let the system derail you. Stay focused on the end goal, be patient and grow your business step-by-step.